Voodoo Island is an adventure interactive fiction game released in 1985. It was designed by M. J. Sayer, developed by Angelsoft, Inc., and published by Mindscape. The player is shipwrecked on an island and has to explore it. Eventually, you have to save it from the grasp of the evil Dr. Beauvais and escape it. You type in commands with a parser and have no time limit.
This game contains examples of:
- As the Good Book Says...: You find a Bible in the Booth Suite. It's covered in mildew and the pages are stuck together, but you can only read a part of a particularly ominous verse.note ...you shall be defeated by your enemies. Your foes shall have the mastery over you, and you shall take flight when there is no one pursuing you.
- Beauty Is Bad: Dr. Beauvais is described as dashingly handsome with facial features that make his French ancestry clear, but he also turned people into zombies and caused them much suffering.
- Big Bad: Dr. Beauvais is responsible for the island being the way it is and turning people into zombies, so you naturally have to stop him.
- Hypnotic Eyes: Zombies can use their eyes to put you in a trance, making you not notice the zombification.
- Inventory Management Puzzle: You only have three item slots and one for dead bodies, so you need to use them well. You can put some items in the tote found west of the cove, but it can only hold small items like the photo and the card.
- Killer Teddy Bear: Picking up the teddy bear will kill you with fiery pinpricks, as it is a wanga, a voodoo object designed to harm one person.
- The Many Deaths of You: Quite a few ways to die, like getting eaten by sharks, crabs, caught in a spiderweb, getting zombified, or killed by Dr. Beauvais.
- Mercy Kill: You kill all three zombies and bury them properly to free them from the grip of Dr. Beauvais.
- Multiple Endings: Not counting the death scenes, there's a good ending and a bad ending, depending on whether you kept the voodoo doll while leaving the island.
- Press Start to Game Over: Going south in the first screen will result in your death as you get torn to shreds by sharks.
- Sanity Slippage: The game says things like "Your grip on reality is beginning to weaken" and "Your wits have escaped you" when you type in words it doesn't recognise, but no actual gameplay effects happen.
- Undeathly Pallor: Zombies have their skin described as pale or pasty white.
- Video Game Cruelty Punishment: Trying to attack Moma makes her glare at you menacingly and mutter words that you don't understand, then you fall off the cliff and die on jagged rocks.
- Voodoo Doll: You have to destroy a rag doll to defeat Dr. Beauvais, otherwise he'll cause your attempt to leave the island to fail.
- You Can't Get Ye Flask: Saying "GIVE NECKLACE" when referring to Moma doesn't work. You have to use "TRADE NECKLACE" (you get a linen shirt in exchange, so it kinda works).
